By Ken Marantz
OCA Media
Toyohashi, Japan, September 27, 2026: Given all the runners Korea kept leaving stranded, it seemed a matter of time before it managed to bring some of them home. It became a necessity after Japan tied the game.
Kim Doyeong and Moon Bogyeong delivered back-to-back RBI singles in the seventh inning and Korea held on to defeat fierce rival Japan 3-1 in the gold-medal game of baseball on a drizzly Sunday night at Toyohashi Municipal Stadium.
Japan had the winning run at the plate when Korean reliever Park Yeonghyun struck out pinch-hitter Masato Shibasaki looking, ending the nail-biting contest and giving Korea its fifth straight Asian Games title and seventh overall.
“Our players were motivated right from the start,” Moon said.
The Korean team was made up entirely of players from the country’s pro baseball league, which did not take a break for the Asian Games, while Japan’s roster was filled with players solely from the semipro corporate league.
Korean starter Gwak Been turned in a sterling performance before giving up three hits and the tying run in the seventh. The Doosan Bears right-hander had limited the Japanese to one hit over six innings while striking out seven – including the side in the second inning.
Jo Byeonghyun picked up the win with an inning of one-hit relief in which he struck out three, while Park earned the save after allowing two hits over the final 1 2/3 innings.
The victory avenged Korea’s 5-0 loss to Japan two days ago in the Super Round of the tournament. The winner of that game, Shin Higuchi, had a much rougher outing as the starter on Sunday, but gave up just one run in his three-inning that saw Korea leave seven runners on base.
Overall, Korea twice left the bases loaded and stranded 16 runners as it outhit Japan 12-7.
With both sides’ cheerleading squads, ubiquitous of Far East baseball, braving the elements to urge their team on, Korea jumped out to a 1-0 lead in the second inning when Yoon Donghee doubled off the right field fence and scored on Moon Hyunbin’s single to left-center field.
Japan tied the game by finally breaking through against Gwak in the seventh inning. Ryosuke Aizawa led off with single to center and, after a strikeout, back-to-back singles to left by Shohei Mizutani and Yuki Sato knocked in Aizawa.
Korea, which had left the bases loaded in the top of the seventh, struck back right away against Japan’s fourth hurler Kazuki Kondo, who would take the loss.
Kim Jichan legged out a double on a hit to left field and was sacrificed to third. After a walk, Kim was caught in a rundown when Jeong Junjae lashed a hard grounder to third, during which Kim Juwon advanced from first to third.
Kim Doyeong then hit a hard grounder that third baseman Sato could not handle, allowing Kim Jichan to score, and Moon Bogyeong followed by singling to center to add the insurance run.
*In the bronze-medal game, Lin Yu-Min allowed just one hit over eight scoreless innings and struck out 10 as Chinese Taipei defeated China 5-1 at Okazaki Central Park Baseball Stadium.
Chen Min-Sih and Yang Po-Hsiang each had two hits and two RBIs for Chinese Taipei, which assured that the medal-winning countries would be the same three that have climbed the podium in all nine editions since baseball was added to the Asian Games program in 1994.
Japan and Chinese Taipei have each won the gold once, the former in 1994 and the latter in 2006.
